How to Fast Track New Business Growth with Innovative Ideas

Standing out in today’s quick-moving and ever-changing marketplace takes creative thinking—especially if you’re trying to grow a new business. Even if you follow the best tips and proven strategies, your brand can get drowned out by the noise other businesses are making. Innovation is the only solution.

As a new business, you’re competing for attention. You’re trying to carve out market share and find a space in the market landscape for your business to live. Finding and implementing innovative ideas will help your new business get noticed even in a sea of other businesses trying to do the same thing. You need to be different. You need to be ahead of the curve. That might sound like a scary proposition, but with some thought and willingness to try out new ideas, innovation can help your business grow. 

THE POWER OF BRAINSTORMING

Get out your whiteboard or your legal pad. It’s time to brainstorm! If you’re lucky, an innovative idea will just come to you. However, if you’re a stressed entrepreneur without much time to think, you might need to work at it. That’s why it’s important to make space for innovation.

With some effort, you’ll be able to come up with a slate of ideas that might work for your business. Not every idea you come up with will be a grand slam, but they might help you stumble on the one idea that is.

Tips for Effective Brainstorming:

• Don’t limit yourself. Let your ideas flow.
• Build on and develop each new idea.
• Consider visual brainstorming. Draw what you are thinking about or create a vision board.
• Try to generate an abundance of ideas, even if they seem too wild.
• Stay focused on the target of your topic.

Once you brainstorm ideas, it’s always important to vet each one before implementing them. What might have seemed like an awesome strategy for one area of business could have negative impacts elsewhere. Understand the pros and cons and make decisions wisely. 

DIFFERENTIATE YOURSELF FROM YOUR COMPETITORS

One of the most important aspects of growing a new business is meeting a need in the market while distinguishing your business from competitors. Unless you stumbled on a truly unique business idea or a huge gap in the marketplace, you likely already have competitors. Why should a potential customer choose your new business over another? You need to understand what makes your business better and highlight that difference.

Looking at this problem creatively can help. Think about what works and doesn’t work for your competitors. Find solutions to the problems that they leave behind. Innovate on existing products and services or bring something brand new to the table. Make sure these new solutions mesh well with the mission and vision of your business.

TRY CREATIVE MARKETING STRATEGIES

Now that you’ve discovered what sets your business apart, you need to make sure your audience gets it. Think about how you can effectively demonstrate your differentiators. What creative marketing techniques might make sense for your business? Are there any grassroots, word-of-mouth, or guerilla marketing tactics that might be effective? Find out where your audience spends time, and pinpoint what can grab their attention in that venue. (If that involves a flashy design, consider making it easily with Canva.)

While you should have a standard marketing program that follows best practices, think about how you can break through the static of standard marketing strategies, especially those used frequently in your industry or by your competitors. If your audience lives on Instagram, you’ll probably be doing Instagram ads. How can you make your ads stand out from every other ad that your audience sees? Can you create a unique voice or develop an attention-grabbing slogan?

DEVELOP A “SIGNATURE MOVE”

Try using a truly unique branding tactic. We’re not just talking about using your brand logo and colors or creating a unique brand voice for your social media accounts. Think of this as your signature move.

For example, if you own a pizza place, maybe you deliver every pizza with a tiny rubber duck with your logo on it. Or if you’re a wedding photographer, maybe you leave a card with a few polaroids in the card box at each wedding you shoot. Or if you own a boutique, maybe your sales associates greet customers the same way every time. Maybe you send a balloon bouquet to your clients on their birthdays. Brainstorm ways to make your brand memorable.

Think outside of the box for this one but try not to be too random. For instance, with the pizza example above, imagine the business is called Duck Pizza. That signature move makes a bit more sense now. Whatever signature move you land on, make sure it connects with the mission of your company or your brand in some way. It needs to make sense to your audience.

MAKE A SPLASH WITH A PUBLICITY STUNT

Consider drumming up free press for your new business with a publicity stunt. This can be an effective tool to put a spotlight on your business, but know that carrying out a publicity stunt can be risky. Success really depends on how the public receives it. That means it needs to hold true to your values as a company while inspiring a positive sentiment. Even with the best of intentions, there are many ways a publicity stunt could go wrong or have unintended consequences. So, make sure you think through your idea thoroughly and run the idea by a few people before diving too deep.

The main goal of a publicity stunt is to generate buzz and conversation about your business. Whether that ends up being articles in your local newspaper, a story on the news, or merely attention on social media, think through what might get people talking. It could be a performance, like a flash mob, in a public location. It could be an intriguing mural or series of billboards. It could even be a popup ping pong tournament at your local park. Let your mind run wild with ideas until you find one that fits your business.

INNOVATE AND GROW!

Supporting your innovative ideas might not be possible all on your own. Delegation is key, especially when you’re trying to accomplish something grand for your business.

Whether you need help with the innovative idea itself or need some other tasks off your plate to focus on that idea, the support of a Virtual Assistant can be a game-changer. They can manage while you’re away making your publicity stunt go off without a hitch or they can support your creative digital marketing scheme. Schedule a free consultation to learn more about how a Virtual Assistant can benefit your business.